Hymen hath brought the bride to bed,
Where, by the lofs of maidenhead,
A babe is moulded :-Be attent,
And time that is fo briefly spent,
With your fine fancies quaintly eche';
What's dumb in fhew, I'll plain with speech.

Dumb fhew.

Enter Pericles and Simonides at one door with Attendants; a Meffenger meets them, kneels, and gives Pericles a letter. Pericles fhews it to Simonides; the Lords kneel to the former. Then enter Thaifa with child, and Lychorida. Simonides fhews his daughter the letter; fhe rejoices: he and Pericles take leave of her father, and depart.

Gow. By many a derne and painful perch',
Of Pericles the careful fearch

By

With your fine fancies quaintly eche;] i. e. eke out. So in the Chorus to King Henry V. (first folio):

66

still be kind,

"And eche out our performance with your mind." Again, in the Merchant of Venice, quarto, 1600 (Heyes's edition):

2

'tis to peeze the time,

"To ech it and to draw it out in length." MALONE. the Lords kneel to the former.] The lords kneel to Pericles, because they are now, for the first time, informed by this letter, that he is king of Tyre" No man," fays Gower in his Conf. Amant.

66

knew the foth cas,

"But he hym felfe; what man he was."

By the death of Antiochus and his daughter, Pericles has also fucceeded to the throne of Antioch, in confequence of having rightly interpreted the riddle propofed to him. MALONE.

3

cret.

By many a derne and painful perch,] Derne is, I believe, seThe word is ufed by Spenfer, B. ii. c. 1. ft. 35.-B. iii. c. i. ft. 14. According to Mr. Upton, it means earneft-eager.The conftruction is fomewhat involved. The careful fearch of Pe

By the four oppofing coignes +,
Which the world together joins,
Is made, with all due diligence,
That horfe and fail, and high expence,
Can ftead the queft. At last from Tyre
(Fame anfwering the moft ftrange enquire ',)
To the court of king Simonides

Are letters brought; the tenour these :
Antiochus and his daughter's dead;
The men of Tyrus, on the head
Of Helicanus would fet on

The crown of Tyre, but he will none:
The mutiny he there haftes t'opprefs;
Says to them, if king Pericles

Come not home in twice fix moons,

He, obedient to their dooms,

Will take the crown. The fum of this,

Brought hither to Pentapolis,

ricles is made by many a derne and painful perch,-by the four appofing coignes, which join the world together;-with all due dili gence, &c. MALONE.

dearn and painful perch,] Dearn fignifies lonely, folitary. See note on King Lear, laft edit. vol. ix. p. 491. A perch is a measure of five yards and a half, STEEVENS.

The

By the four oppofing coignes,] By the four oppofite corner-flones that unite and bind together the great fabrick of the world. word is again used by Shakspeare in Macbeth:

No jutty frieze,

"Buttrefs, or coigne of vantage, but this bird

"Hath made his pendant bed and procreant cradle."

In the paffage before us, the author feems to have confidered the world as a ftupendous edifice, artificially conftructed.-To feek a man in every corner of the globe, is still common language. All the ancient copies read,

By the four oppofing crignesbut there is no fuch English word. For the ingenious emendation inferted in the text, which is produced by the change of a fingle letter, the reader is indebted to Mr. Tyrwhitt. MALONE.

Fame anfvering the moft ftrange enquire,] Why ftrange? It was furely not ftrange, that Pericles' fubjects fhould be folicitous to know what was become of him. Perhaps we should read-the most ftrong enquire;-this earnest, anxious enquiry. MALONE. Yravished

F 4

Yravished the regions round,

And every one with claps 'gan found,
"Our heir apparent is a king;

Who dream'd, who thought of fuch a thing?"
Brief, he muft hence depart to Tyre;
His queen with child, makes her defire
(Which who fhall crofs) along to go;
(Omit we all their dole and woe :)
Lychorida her nurse she takes,

And fo to fea. Their veffel shakes
On Neptune's billow; half the flood

Hath their keel cut?; but fortune's mood 3

8

Varies

Iranifhed the regions round,] Thus the oldeft quarto. Read, yravished, in imitation of antiquated ftyle. STEEVENS. From the falfe print of the first edition, the fubfequent editors formed a still more abfurd reading:

Irony fhed the regions round

Mr. Steevens's ingenious emendation, to which I have payed due attention by inferting it in the text, is strongly confirmed by the following paffage in Gower de Confeffione Amantis:

"This tale after the kynge it had
"Pentapolin all overfprad,
"There was no joye for to feche,
"For every man it had in fpeche,
And faiden all of one accorde;
"A worthy kynge fhall ben our lorde.
"That thought us first an heavines
"Is fhape us nowe to great gladnes.

"Thus goth the tydinge over all." MALONE.
balf the flood

Hath their keel cut;

They have made half their voyage with a favourable wind. So Gower:

When thei were in the fea amid,

"Out of the north thei fee a cloude;
"The ftorme arofe, the wyndes loude
"Thei blewen many a dredeful blaste,

"The welken was all over-cafte." MALONE.

half the flood

Hath their keel cut; but fortune mov'd,]

Moved could never be defigned as a rhime to flood. I fuppofe

we fhould read,

Varies again the grizzled north
Difgorges fuch a tempeft forth,
That, as a duck for life that dives,
So up and down the poor fhip drives.
The lady fhrieks, and well-a-near
Doth fall in travail with her fear:
And what enfues in this fell ftorm ",
Shall for itself, itself perform;
I nill relate'; action may
Conveniently the rest convey:

Which might not what by me is told.-
In your imagination hold

This ftage, the fhip, upon whofe deck
The fea-toft Pericles appears to fpeak 3.

but fortune's mood—

i. e. difpofition. So in Othello:

66

"Albeit unused to the melting mood—”

whofe eyes

muddied in fortune's mood

Again, in All's Well that Ends Well:

9

[Exit.

STERVENS.

in this fell ftorm,] This is the reading of the earliest quarto. The folios and the modern editions have felf storm.

MALONE.

I nill relate;] The further confequences of this ftorm I shall not defcribe. MALONE.

Which might not what by me is told.] i. e. which might not conveniently convey what by me is told, c. What enfues may conveniently be exhibited in action; but action could not well have difplayed all the events that I have now related. MALONE. 3 In your imagination hold

This ftage, the fhip, upon whofe deck

The fea-toft Pericles appears to fpeak.]

It is clear from thefe lines, that when the play was originally performed, no attempt was made to exhibit either a fea or a fhip. -The enfuing fcene and fome others must have fuffered confiderably in the reprefentation, from the poverty of the ftage-apparatus in the time of our author. MALONE.

SCENE

SCENE I.

Enter Pericles on a ship at fea.

Per. Thou God of this great vaft, rebuke thefe

furges*,

Which wash both heaven and hell; and thou that haft
Upon the winds command, bind them in brafs,
Having call'd them from the deep! O ftill thy
deafning,

Dreadful, thunders; gently quench thy nimble,
Sulphurous, flashes !-O how, Lychorida,
How does my queen?—Thou storm, venomously 5,
Wilt

• Thou God of this great vaft, rebuke thefe furges,] The expreffion is borrowed from the facred writings: "The waters stood above the mountains;-at thy rebuke they fled; at the voice of thy thunder they hafted away. It fhould be remembered, that Pericles is here fuppofed to fpeak from the deck of his fhip. Lychorida on whom he calls, in order to learn fome intelligence of his queen, is fuppofed to be beneath, in the cabin.

This fpeech is exhibited in fo ftrange a form in the original, and all the fubfequent editions, that I fhall lay it before the reader, that he may be enabled to judge in what a corrupted state this play has hitherto appeared, and be induced to treat the editor's imperfect attempts to restore it to integrity, with the more indulgence, "The God of this great vaft, rebuke these surges,

"Which wafh both heaven and hell; and thou that hast
"Upon the windes commaund, bind them in braffe;
"Having call'd them from the deepe, ô still
"Thy deafning dreadful thunders, gently quench
"Thy nimble fulphirous flashes, ô How Lychorida!
"How does my queene? then ftorm venomously,
"Wilt thou fpeat all thyfelf? the sea-man's whistle
"Is as a whisper in the ears of death,
"Unheard Lychorida? Lucina oh!
"Divineft patrionefs and my wife gentle

To those that cry by night, convey thy deitie
"Aboard our dauncing boat, make fwift the pangues

"Of my queenes travayles? now Lychorida.'

Thou form, venomously

5

Wilt thou fpit all thyself? —

-]

MALONE.

All the copies read-then ftorm, &c. which cannot be right, because it renders the paffage nonfenfe. The flight change that I kave made, affords an eafy fenfe. MALONE.

I would